Yes. Nintendo had more franchises I absolutely loved as kid then Mario.

That's a really interesting question because Mario means so much to Nintendo AND the video game industry. Super Mario Bros. was such a revolutionary game -- it helped rebuild the fledgling industry, shifted the balance of power from America to Japan, and inspired a legion of young game designers. So I think there would be a lot fewer video game fans in general without Mario.

Personally, I would probably have drifted toward Nintendo anyway. The first NES games I remember playing are Duck Hunt and Bubble Bobble, and then I fell in love with Zelda, Donkey Kong, F-Zero, and Street Fighter on SNES. I still hold Super Mario in high regard -- I'd place it second after Zelda -- but Nintendo has such a healthy stable of first-party properties that I could survive without Mario.

I really liked Mario 3 and World, I first played them about the same time, I thought 3 was the stronger game between the two. It wasn't until later that I really became a Nintendo fan. The Zelda games were alright too.

Donkey Kong Country was really much more instrumental in making me mostly a Nintendo fan than anything. I did play Nintendo stuff before, but it seemed to be around Donkey Kong Country that there was a short burst of games from companies developing for Nintendo that were extremely high quality. Even to this day they make up a large portion of my favourite games. Of course, back then I was still importing most things. That was one big problem Nintendo had until the Wii, they never released enough games in Europe. Then again, on the N64 and Gamecube, there were just never enough games period. 

While I was always a strong Nintendo fan due to their handhelds, Wii Sports made me a Nintendo home console fan again. Or at least really caught my attention for the platform. While there were some interesting Nintendo games on N64, they were few and far between, and the Gamecube pretty much had nothing of interest, except a few things that were available and better on other systems anyway. There was a good 7-8 years where Nintendo home consoles might as well have not existed.

Being born and raised during the NES era, I would have to say yes, I would still be a Nintendo fan if there had been no Mario. See, prior to the N64, when people thought of Nintendo, they didn't just think of Nintendo-owned IP's. They thought of Castlevania, Street Fighter, Mega Man, Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest (or Dragon Warrior as it was called back in the day), Ninja Gaiden, and many more third party franchises that would eventually gain popularity on other consoles. The Nintendo brand was known for having game systems that had a large volume of both the most popular games and the best quality games. This was true for both the first and third party games. Also, gamers back then didn't think games in terms of first and third party. Much like how Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy VII, and Resident Evil would define the PlayStation brand, any great game that was also popular could define the Nintendo brand.

My first game of nintendo



So yehh, even without mario I would be a fan :)

The Last Story is made by a third party developer.

Pretty much every mario game was bundled on ds, pokemon on the otherhand can sell without the need off bundles

Xenoblade is first party? Didn't know that.

During the Nes days, I was a much bigger fan of games like Contra, Bionic Commando, Ninja Turtles, Metal Gear, Punch Out, Tecmo Bowl, Double Dribble, etc. Everybody had Super Mario Bros. 1 but by the time I played it, there were a lot of games that were just more exciting to me. I didn't actually get really excited for Mario games (or even Nintendo's titles) until Super Mario Bros. 3. I played that game late and realized that the game was good. I mean, REALLY GOOD.

So, no. I was a Nintendo fan because of the third party titles just like I was a Sony fan for about a decade based entirely on the third parties.

Both Nintendo and video-games would never have existed without Mario.